How to get rid of "Outlook Data File"?

I've been transferring one of our office computers from XP to 7. We couldn't get the old Outlook that the office personnel got used to, so we had to buy the latest "atrocity" MS sells. When I thought I exported and then imported the pst file I got this "Outlook data file" besides the email folder. Take a look:

enter image description here

Worst still, when an email is sent from an outside accounting program it is placed into that f'ing "Outlook data file" instead of our email's outbox. As a result the outbound emails sit in that data file and are never sent out.

Then if I go into account settings and try to delete that "Outlook data file" it gives me this BS:

enter image description here

but then when I try to set our email as default, it is grayed out:

enter image description here

So my question is how to get rid of this "Outlook data file" and make my emails from an outside accounting program to be actually placed into the outbox for the email account and thus be sent out?

PS. Aghhh! Why, Microsoft? Why!!!!!!!

ahmd1

Posted 2013-02-26T18:58:42.693

Reputation: 972

Have you tried going to the file's location and just removing the file? You can also contact your office's IT staff for assistance. – Ramhound – 2013-02-26T20:25:38.563

@Ramhound: We're a small office and don't have the IT staff that you may think. What file shall I remove because Kaveh's method doesn't work? – ahmd1 – 2013-02-26T23:26:11.263

@ahmd1 - I have no idea where your data file is. Check your settings within Outlook. – Ramhound – 2013-02-27T02:46:55.393

Answers

First of all, close Microsoft Outlook, then go through Control Panel, and choose Mail and then choose Data Files, then change new default mail storage to your preference and then open and close Outlook. Come back and now you can delete old .pst file from there.

Hope that I helped.

Kaveh

Posted 2013-02-26T18:58:42.693

Reputation: 689

Don't forget to delete the corresponding Outlook files in C:\Users\username\Documents\Outlook Files (a Win10 path) – Yannis Dran – 2015-12-09T12:04:34.673

Thanks. I get the same thing as on those screenshots above. If I highlight the line that I need to keep, it doesn't let me set it as default, and I can't remove the other line because it is set as default :) – ahmd1 – 2013-02-26T22:29:34.370

by the way you can control this by closing out look and using mail in control panel. – Kaveh – 2013-02-27T11:15:09.980

It might be the way to do it. For some weird reason after having sat for a day it started working and now emails do get sent out. I will stop worrying about it since I hate Outlook and the mere mentioning of it gives me a headache. Thanks for your reply. I'll mark it as an answer, since it's the most popular one... – ahmd1 – 2013-02-27T19:44:51.113

I found a workaround is to rename the Outlook Data File by right clicking the file and selecting "Data File Properties", then clicking "Advanced...", Then clearing the "Name:" field. All this leaves is the little arrow which is hardly noticeable.

Nick94928

Posted 2013-02-26T18:58:42.693

Reputation: 1

I needed to export contacts from my received emails so I needed to My workaround for this is as below.

From within outlook go to File>Info>Account Settings. Click on Data Files tab.
Open file locations for both data files.
Close outlook.
Cut and move the Outlook Data File.pst to another folder as back-up.
Now open outlook and it will ask the location of the data file. So copy the file location of the .pst file you want to put as default and click OK.

Now you should have the default data file same as your email IMAP folder. But you will still have two tabs on the navigation panel for the same item.

Shariq

Posted 2013-02-26T18:58:42.693

Reputation: 1

Kaveh answer is more simple – Sam – 2017-05-24T08:31:16.407

IMAP based PST files are closely controlled by Outlook (due to syncing issues) and you can't set them as default Data Files. However, that shouldn't be a problem because as long as everything else is configured properly you can avoid needing it.

In Account Settings make sure you have set your E-mail to default to the IMAP account (this should make external 'mailto:' links default to the IMAP account). Then edit your IMAP account click More settings... and make sure the Sent Items tab is saving to an IMAP folder and not any other data file.

Then simply re-order the PST data files in the Outlook bar (by dragging them) so that the unwanted one is at the bottom.

snowdude

Posted 2013-02-26T18:58:42.693

Reputation: 2 560